In addition to the fact that pointing out fascist rhetoric is important in general,

This fear campaign against Springfield’s Haitian immigrants contains echoes of some of the oldest xenophobic stereotypes.

Vance began to speak about Springfield in early July...

There, Vance mentioned Springfield as part of a line of questioning that sought to tie immigration to inflated housing costs across the country.

Vance ratcheted up his rhetoric the following day at the National Conservatism conference.

From a city official mentioned in the article

The sad thing is none of this was stirred up until JD Vance started publicizing it,” Ruby told TPM. “It was an internal thing that we were handling and handling well.

So they aren't just spouting crazy shit, this is intentional and calculated, to divide and defeat a city that was already on the right path